October 30

I have been played in each and every one of my past five relationships. Now I have hooked up with this girl who seems nice, but I think that it is too good to be true. I want everything to go well but with my luck with relationships it will bomb. How can I be sure that she won’t play me like all the rest? Please get back to me.

— Been Played

Dear Played,

You can’t be sure she won’t play you “like all the rest.” In fact, she definitely will. Because that’s the way you look at relationships.

Listen up. In a strictly statistical sense (and in a world where people get married only once), all relationships but one come to an end. So what you are experiencing, Played, is life. What you are doing to make sense of it all — which is what humans do — is calling it “my luck with relationships.”

Look, people want more than anything in the whole world to be right, right? (Why do you think I write an advice column?) Anyway, you’ve issued the statement “I Am A Person Who Gets Played In Relationships.” And so, in each relationship you get into — whatever its demise — you say to yourself, “There you go. I got played.” Why? Because you (like any normal human) have to be right about the fact that you get played in relationships. Otherwise, you wouldn’t know what to do or , frankly, who you are. And otherwise, you’d have to take a little responsibility instead of blaming “all the rest.” See what I mean ?

So how about issuing this statement: “I Am A Person Who Does His Best to Make Relationships Work.” Now get in there and have a girlfriend instead of sitting around being a bullseye for the bomb.

October 28

Well, boil me in beer and ship me to Sheboygan — it’s an update from Chris the Lonely Bratwurst! When we first met Chris, he wondered how he could translate his confidence as an improv performer into smoothness with the laydees off stage, one on one. Later, he wrote back wondering how he could get his all-partnered-up friends to for God’s sake stop calling him The Single One or, at one fateful barbecue, “Chris the Lonely” … yeah.

Here’s what he has to say!

This is Chris, aka Chris The Lonely Bratwurst, aka Chris the Improvising Bratwurst… aka now Chris the Married Bratwurst.

After writing a few times in 2000, getting published in your column, and taking your advice to heart, I figured out a lot of things and actually started dating. In 2003, I met the girl I would eventually marry in 2006. We now live in the midwest and are absolutely loving life.

I can honestly tell you that in the long process I went through to overcome my shyness, you were a difference maker. And I wanted to make sure you know that you can add that tally to the board.

Thank you a million times over, and continue to pass on the good word!

This week’s letter is from a Weekday Dater that can’t wrangle her boy for some weekend lovin’. Is he truly “too busy” for this relationship? Lynn helps her sift through the clues. Read the letter at Happen, then come back here to comment!

October 23

I am living overseas and I met a guy over the holidays who was just in town for two weeks. I met him one night and we just clicked. I didn’t want it to happen since I knew he would be leaving, but it did. I always believed that when you find that right guy you will know from the moment you meet him, and with him I got that feeling. It was amazing. Now he is gone but we do keep in touch with e-mail and when he can call he does. The problem is that I know there’s a 95% chance that I’ll never see him again. Now whenever I meet guys I just can’t get interested in them no matter how great they might be. Should I just forget my first love and move on, or should I let time take its toll. I feel so empty without him, though.

October 21

P.S. Our spy, who saw them the other night, reports that they also sang (not from the album) “Your Love is Like Time Warner Cable.” (You know, as in, “I hate you but can’t live without you.”) Other titles included I’ll Only Support Your Art for So Long, Find Me on Facebook, I Don’t Want to Hold Your Baby, The Pantsuit, and Your Boyfriend Has a Boyfriend.
P.P.S. New Yorkers in inter-borough relationships, please do not miss Weekend Service Changes.
P.P.S.S. Attention concert bookers: Menage a Twang + Rob Paravonian = music comedy heaven.

A new study shows the link between sex and sharing the housework. The Wall Street Journal reports:

“Earlier studies have hinted at this connection for men; the sight of a husband mopping the floor or doing dishes sparks affection in the hearts of many wives. But the more-housework-equals-more-sex link for wives, documented in a study of 6,877 married couples published online recently in the Journal of Family Issues, is a surprise.” – (via Pat’s Papers)

It’s all rather wife/gender biased, but so is life and that’s the problem, boo!

Interesting revelation: no matter what the individual attitudes about gender roles, both partners pitching in meant for a more satisfying and frequent sex life. Now that’s bipartisan!

It’s all about partnership and shared goals, coupled with (no pun intended) a work hard/play hard attitude that reinforces the team spirit, lack of selfishness, and mutual support. It reflects a willingness to respond to the needs of the other — which is tres important in the boudoir, n’est pas?

Not surprisingly these couples make sex a priority, and working on a task together — no matter how mundane — sparks relationship chemistry.

By Ehrenreich’s theory, Oprah, Chopra and “The Secret” are just a few of the must-be-upbeat forces persuading Americans to believe in, well, believing. Which, ironically, has led to such less-than-positive sitches as the recent mortgage crisis and… breast-cancer awareness ribbons? Seems that Ehrenreich’s own ordeal with breast cancer — and its attendant “Pink Ribbon Culture” — was what sparked the subject for her latest book.

I have never had breast cancer and I have never read Ehrenreich’s book. Am I still allowed to say that its premise feels like an icky slippery slope? Over on YourTango.com, Ehrenreich’s contentions were interpreted by one writer thusly:

“As Ehrenreich sees it, the positive attitude movement can lead to disasterous results—partly because it is so intent on seeing ‘the glass half full, even when it is shattered on the floor.’ Thus, it might lead you to believe that if you just change your attitude, you can go from being hurt and bothered by your husband’s abuse and cheating to being grateful for the fact that you even have a husband.”

With all due respect to loving my fellow bloggers and all, do we really want to put forth the assumption that women in abusive relationships are that unintelligent? That they can’t distinguish between being your own cheerleader and being stuck in a physically dangerous environment?